


The Mists of Time

by Menomegirl



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-12
Updated: 2010-09-12
Packaged: 2017-10-11 17:36:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/114915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Menomegirl/pseuds/Menomegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fictional tale about a slayer and her friend, set in Ancient Greece.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mists of Time

**The Mists of Time**

 _Late summer, Greece_

 

The sun shines down with unremitting heat on the two combatants in the emptiness of the small arena. The young girls are dressed the same:short tunics and both are sweaty and dirty.

They fight with the staffs and the solid sound of the wood repeatedly connecting is loud in the courtyard. To the casual observer, the blonde would appear to be the better with the weapon as she effortlessly knocks the brown haired girl down.

"Thea, that's not fair! You didn't give me a chance!" Adera says.

"You baby! Come on, stand up and we'll go again," Thea replies, holding out her hand for the other girl to take.

Adera smiles, pulls herself up and holds up her staff at the ready position. Thea circles around her before assuming the same stance, holding her staff in the same position.

"Are you ready, Priestess-to-be?" Thea taunts Adera.

"I was born ready, Slayer-in-training," Adera replies.

They both grin at each other, then two girls warily begin circling, each looking for an opening to strike. They began to fight, the staffs making a solid _thunk_ every time they connect.

Adera sees an opening and hooks her staff behind Thea's right ankle, flipping her onto her back and quickly places her staff over Thea's heart. "I have defeated you, oh mighty Slayer. You are dead!"

Thea closes her eyes in defeat and goes totally limp, playing dead for a heartbeat's worth of time before both of them crack up laughing.

Adera drops the staff and lay down beside Thea, still giggling. After a few minutes, they stop and started looking at the clouds, naming shapes and being the eight-year-old girls that they are.

"Look, Adera! That one is a lamb," Thea points out.

"Looks more like a lion to me," Adera responds after contemplating the billowing cloud.

That comment sends them into another bout of laughter. "I see an apple and you see a pomegranate!" Adera breathlessly exclaims.

"I see an deer and you see a goat!" Thea says.

"I train to kill vampires I've never seen!"

"I train to serve a god I've never seen!"

Another round of girlish giggles follows and after the laughter dies down once more, they both grin and look at each other, basking in the warmth of the late summer afternoon.

*****************

 _Several years later, on the verge of womanhood._

The two friends are in Thea's chambers practicing throwing knives at crudely drawn figures on a wall. Thea's knives hit with slightly more accuracy than Adera's.

Suddenly, Adera stops and walks over to the sleeping couch and sits down. "I'm too tired today, Thea".

Thea walk over to Adera. "You've been too tired a lot lately. Ever since you returned from the trip to see the Oracle at Delphi. Did something happen? What did the Oracle tell you? Is that why you don't want to practice with me much any more?"

"You know I'm not supposed to tell what the Oracle revealed!"

Thea sat down beside her, placing her hand on Adera's. "I'm your best friend. I know something is eating away at you. You can tell me! I'll help if I can."

Adera shook her head and sat up, started flipping the throwing knives a little in the air, catching them quickly.

"Adera, please!" Thea said.

Adera stopped flipping the knives and folded them together, within her right hand. "The Oracle speaks in hidden meanings and her words aren't always clear. She told me I would walk the path of Athena. I don't see the point of learning to defend myself from creatures of the night when I'm going to be some sort of spiritual leader. I..."

Adera stands and begins pacing in a small area. "I am not going to be the slayer, Thea. You are."

Thea smiled and walked to her friend. "That doesn't matter. You are nearly as good as I am. If what we practice at one day saves your life, then it's worth every minute of it. Come on, let it go! Smile for me, please?"

Adera grinned. "You're so funny! I bruise for a week, while you heal in a day or two! Is that what you call _nearly as good_?"

Thea smiled. "You are! Now, come on. Let's.."

They both turn as a servant enters the room. "The teacher has asked for the lady Thea to join her at the archery field."

Thea rolled her eyes, then sighed. "I hate archery. See you tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow, yes. Good luck!" Adera called as Thea left her chambers.

She held up the knives and frowns. "The Oracle told me I'd walk with the shadow of you on my heart for eternity," she whispers, then throws the knives behind her without looking and walks from the room. One knife buries itself in the head of a drawing, the other in the heart.

*****************

 _A small span of years later._

 

Within Adera's chambers, the two friends are consumed with an argument. The fading afternoon sun casts shadows along the walls, lending a false glow in the chill of the early evening.

Thea reaches out and takes Adera's shoulders, shaking her. "You can't do this! You cannot abandon your calling! You can't just walk out!"

Adera breaks free from Thea and hotly replies, "I don't have a true calling. I never did! My parents left me here, like an unwanted pet! Thea- I'm not like you. I want a life. I want to see the world. I wasn't chosen for some noble destiny. I'm just...me."

"You're afraid. And you're running away! Adera, this isn't like you. You're leaving with some man I've never met- I'll never see you again!"

Adera coldly turns away from her lifelong friend and continues stuffing garments into a valise. "This conversation is over. I'm leaving. We've been at odds for over a year now and despite what you say, I'm sure you'll be relieved when I'm gone. Don't you have an apocalypse to stop? You need to worry about your duty, and stop trying to run my life!"

"I'm sorry you feel that way, Adera." A sad and resigned look came over Thea's face, which Adera could not see, then she turned to walk out, pausing at the threshold of the door before she left. "If I never see you again...always remember I loved you."

Adera closed her eyes and sank to her knees as quietness descended in the wake of Thea's exit. "I love you, too," she whispered.

**********************

 _Later in the night._

 

Adera maneuvers her horse carefully through the trees, slowing as she nears the tumbling ruins of an ancient temple. Bringing the animal to a halt and dismounting, she glances around, possibly sensing that something is wrong.

Adera enters the ruins, expecting to find the man she'd been running to waiting for her. Instead, she sees another woman laying face down amid the crumpled rocks and debris scattered on the stone floors. She rushes forward and bends down to see that it's Thea.

Adera gently turns her over and gasps at the shock of seeing the bite marks on her best friend's neck. She touches Thea's throat, then bends lower to listen for a heartbeat, even though she knows her friend is dead.

There's nothing but silence and after a minute or so, she lifts back up and that's when she notices the grime on her friend's clothing, the wooden stake clenched in the grip of Thea's hand and the small pile of dust that had lain underneath Thea's body.

The chaos within her mind accepts the two realities it has denied in the space of time since she'd found her friend: the ring amid the dust and the blood on Thea's lips. Adera's shaking hand reaches out and picks up the ring and she sees what she feared was true. The ring had belonged to the man she'd planned on leaving with.

It had been a trap, she knew that now. It had never been about her. Only about the Slayer. And it was worse than death, for she knew what that blood on Thea's lips meant, and in her deepening sorrow, she realized that Thea had killed him with what was undoubtedly her last strength.

Thea had come to stop her from leaving, and met the most horrible ending a Slayer could know and it was all her fault. Her best friend was dead, her soul was lost, and she would become one of the creatures she'd been trained to kill since childhood, had in fact been hunting and slaying for the last year.

What about the apocalypse she was supposed to thwart? That was tomorrow!

 _Thea can't be dead_ , her mind said to her. _No, she can't be dead. She has to fight the darkness, she has to defeat the evil that's trying to overrun the land._

Her fingers closed around the ring within the ashes and she palmed it, fingers curling around it to make a fist and Adera screamed, "NO! NO! NO!", then she started weeping in wild abandon over the body of her friend.

From the recesses of her mind came a memory from childhood, a memory of Thea's voice: _Into every generation a slayer is born. One girl in all the world, with the strength and skill to fight the vampires and the powers of darkness._

And the memory of the Oracle of Delphi: _Your destiny is to walk the path of Athena. She alone will set what your course will be. She will offer you a choice that is not a true choice: life or death. Perhaps both. It will be your actions that bring you and your friend to the brink of disaster; it will be your actions that will save or destroy the world. You will walk with the shadow of the slayer on your heart for eternity._

 

Adera lifted her head, knowing now what she must do and slid the ring on her finger, determined to wear it always in memory of this night and what her selfish desires had caused.

Then she began the task of moving the body of her friend to the horse awaiting her outside and made her way out of the ruins.

**************************

 _In the temple of Athena_

Adera knelt in supplication before the alter in the sanctuary of Athena, having bolted the doors when she entered. No one was usually around in the dead of night, but she had wanted no interruptions.

She had been praying to Athena for over an hour, begging for the life of her friend. She was now reduced to helpless crying, having come to the conclusion that if Athena didn't answer her call, she would have to remove the head from Thea's body to prevent her rise as one of the undead.

As she sat there weeping, she noticed the room filling with a soft golden glow. In wonder, she looked up to find the Goddess before her.

"Ah, my dear Adera! You plight has touched my heart and I have come to grant your request, but there is a steep price attached. Think carefully before you agree. You are asking for the life and soul of your beloved slayer to be returned, so she can fulfill her destiny and remove the guilt from your heart," Athena said, reaching out to run the back of her hand along one side of Adera's face. "The fates must balance. For me to grant your request, your destiny must be sacrificed. I will extract a promise from you, and you must agree to certain conditions. And even though I do this, Thea will still only have one day of life left. She will avert the coming apocalypse, but the effort will cost her life. This is as it was always meant to be. I cannot change that. Is one day worth an eternity to you?"

Adera answered with all her heart: "Yes."

"Then you must take her place. But since you are asking not only out of a selfish desire to undo what your actions have wrought, but a desire to save humanity as well, I will temper my judgment. Once it is done, nothing in time or space will alter it. Do you agree?"

Adera answered with all her heart: "Yes."

"I will create you a daughter of Lilith. Your heart will beat and you will be able to walk in the sun as if you are a part of mankind. But you will not be. You will retain your soul, because you are sacrificing for the greater good of the world. You may not feed off humans, and you must never create one of your own kind and you must remain untouched by the hands of man. Do you agree?"

Adera answered with all her heart: "Yes."

"The time between now and what's to come are immeasurable. You will go through many trials and heartaches before this comes to pass. You must trust in your heart to lead you, for there lies the only truth that is real and even then, you will not see clearly enough to know the correct path to take. What I have asked of you will build a core of hardness within you and in time, you will become almost a goddess yourself. Do you understand and agree?"

"Yes, Athena, goddess of war and wisdom. I understand the price you have laid before me. I agree. I will not fail you."

Athena smiled and placed her hands on both Adera and Thea, and the room filled with an amber glow as their destinies were corrected and changed.

*********************

The end.

 

This story is a work of fiction. The concept of The Slayer belongs to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy but the story itself and these characters are mine.


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